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Wednesday, July 22, 2015

Mexico Drug War-Michoacán: Soldiers Fired Against Ostula Civilians, Not Into the Air - Community Leaders

Community Leaders from Ostula, Michoacán, speak at press conference in Mexico City
Photo: Cristina Rodríguez
La Jornada: José Antonio Román

At a press conference, residents of the community of Santa María Ostula, municipality of Aquila, Michoacán, rejected the official [government] version stating that in an attempt to disperse the populace, military forces fired into the air. Agustín Vera, [Ostula] community head and spokesperson, and Ezekiel Celestino, a member of the Committee for Public Security, stated:
"They fired so the people would get out of the way. They fired on civilians."
They declared that the detention of Cemeí (sic) [Semeí] Verdía Zepeda—coordinator of the self-defense groups in the region, who is now accused of the crime of carrying weapons for the exclusive use of the Army—was a betrayal of the [Ostula] Community Police, since they had been working with the state government. This is in addition to the fact that their commander was tricked to come to the place where he was arrested [having breakfast in La Placita, municipality of Aguila].

The comuneros* delivered copies of agreements, derived from working meetings and signed by Michoacán's Secretary of Public Security, in which 50 posts for Rural Force were approved for the municipality of Aquila [MV Note: Posts presumably to be filled by self-defense members under Verdía's command, since this has been the practice in Michoacán]. 

They argued that state authorities themselves provided them [self-defense members] with the weapons in Verdía's possession, which was the "pretext" for their commander's arrest. Cemeí Verdía received a salary for that job as head of the self-defense group. Ostula representatives said:
"He has his pay stubs in order."
Recounting last Sunday's events—where a 12-year-old died boy died from a bullet to the head, and four others (one a six-year-old girl [now reported dead]) were injured—Vera and Celestino pointed out that everything indicates "complicity" between personnel from both the Army and Federal Police with leaders of The Knights Templar criminal group in the municipalities of Aquila, Chinicuila, Coahuayana and Coalcomán, for the purpose of insulting and attacking the people of this region.

The community leaders insisted that the only shots fired that Sunday were fired by military and federal forces who arrived in the area to arrest Commander Cemeí (sic) [Semeí] Verdía.
MV Update: La Jornada (7/22/2015): The Office of the Attorney General (PGR) took criminal action against Cemeí (sic) Verdía Zepeda, self-defense leader from the municipality of Aquila, Michoacán, charging him with ... carrying firearms for the exclusive use of armed forces. The self-defense leader was sent to Federal Center of Social Rehabilitation [maximum security prison], Number 4, in Tepic, Nayarit. ... Spanish original
Vera and Celestino reported that at 5:00 p.m. that Sunday, after Cemeí Verdía's arrest, Marine, State and Federal Police forces, joined by soldiers from the 86th [Infantry] Battalion, attacked with firearms, truncheons and tear gas the roadblocks set up by the comuneros. Passing by the offices of Ixtapilla, municipality of Aquila, they fired on houses and civilians, which resulted in the death of Edilberto García Reyes, 12.

Both leaders denounced that behind this open intent to exterminate the self-defense groups and Community Police in this region of the [Pacific] Coast and [Sierra] mountains of Michoacán is the aim of seizing the area to drive tourism megaprojects and exploit mineral deposits.

With the death of the minor Edilberto Reyes, 34 murders and several disappeared have been reported in the region from 2008 to the present.

Ostula's community leaders also presented a video showing the slow advance of military vehicles on the Ostula bridge, which is about 60 meters [66 yards] long. The firing of guns are heard, apparently from the head of the military convoy. People are heard screaming and running for cover.

Ostula's representatives were accompanied by Fernando Rios, Executive Secretary of the Network All Rights for All (Red TDT), and Jorge Luis Hernández, from the Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Center, both of whom expressed their concern about this "act of aggression against civil society", which they categorized as gravely serious. Spanish original
*MV Note: Comuneros are members of indigenous communities whose land was granted to them by the Spanish king after the conquest. Comuneros own and work their land collectively. Article 2 of Mexico’s Constitution recognizes the right of these indigenous communities to choose self-government under traditional Uses and Customs, or indigenous customary law, which includes a system of justice. Ostula Community Police were originally established under Uses and Customs. The people's assembly is the traditional decision-making mechanism; decisions themselves are communal and consensual.
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